


Fifty Fake Dates

by penlex



Category: Leverage
Genre: 5 Times, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 16:44:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14217423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/penlex/pseuds/penlex
Summary: There are a few different reasons to fake date your best friend(s), and if you happen to be in love with them you'll probably find a few more.OR: 5 Times the OT3 Does Fake Dating +1 Time It Leads to Dating Dating (Dating)





	Fifty Fake Dates

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ftmsteverogers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ftmsteverogers/gifts).



The little bell they put in over the door jingles when people come in now. It's cheerful and Parker loves it and Alec kind of loves it too and he would bet a lot that Eliot doesn't find it at all annoying like he acts like he does. It seems somehow… domestic. Just one more tick mark in the pro column of permanence.

Anyway, the point is, when the bell jingles over the door, Alec is sort of predisposed by now to just automatically feel cheerful. So it's like whiplash when the bell jingles and he looks up to see someone who makes him feel distinctly not cheerful.

Keith. Keith Midgley. The  _dick_.

Keith and Alec had dated in Alec's freshman year of college. Alec had been fresh out of the closet and Keith had been an upperclassman in a fraternity. He was popular and good looking and rich and adorably ignorant - not a real thing, Alec knows now, but back then… He had, and apparently still has, that blonde sun-kissed surfer look. They had dated, and had a lot of sex, and Keith liked to take a lot of selfies together which was kind of sweet. But also, Keith liked for Alec to do his homework for him. Mostly that part. When Alec called it off Keith had sort of not taken no for an answer, consistently misunderstanding all of Alec's We Need To Talk talks until Alec had been forced to get mean.

Alec doesn't really _mind_ being mean to people who deserve it, mind, but in that context it had still been really difficult, and just a little bit scary up until that point, and Alec would just rather not repeat any of it. Not that the logical part of Alec's brain really thinks it would come to that now, here, on his own turf more than a dozen years later. But sometimes the logical part of your brain doesn't make as much noise as the other parts.

So instead of a nice, smooth, "Hey, check out this asshole who just walked in," Alec instead blurts out, "Shit, oh dang, what the fuck."

Eliot, who is sitting - for a variable definition of the word - on the stool next to where Alec has been leaning against the bar proudly surveying his kingdom, sets down his beer and raises his eyebrows with deceptive calm.

"No, it's no big deal," Alec reassures quickly, though it's probably not very reassuring at all considering Alec's voice is maybe two octaves higher than it really should be. "No big deal at all, I just need you to act like my boyfriend."

Probably it would have been better to just let Eliot think Keith is some sort of Bad Guy (as opposed to just your garden variety bad guy) and deal with it that way. But then again Eliot can be a little overprotective sometimes so maybe he would have flattened Keith into their nice floors and they would have had to scrub dudebro out of the grout. Nasty.

"What- No, Hardison, what the hell?" Eliot snaps, sitting straighter. He looks just a little bit wild eyed about it, which Alec doesn't know what to make of. It's not the queer thing, because Eliot has had to fake date male marks in the past, once or twice (once or twice that Alec doesn't like to think about because thinking about Eliot with another man makes him think about Eliot with a certain other man, namely himself, which is just bad for all parties and also possibly the environment). Whatever, it doesn't matter- can't matter right now, because Keith has just spotted him and is all shocked and coming over.

"Do it," Alec insists, grabbing Eliot's elbow and tugging him onto his feet. "Do it, Eliot, he's coming over, we're boyfriends starting right now."

"Alec Hardison!" Keith calls out, close enough now for that to be only a little bit obnoxious.

"We're not boyfriends," Eliot growls. Alec reluctantly waves to Keith and Keith waves back, and is he checking Alec out? Obviously Alec is something real nice to look at and all, but a man could have some subtlety.

"I'm gonna be acting like we're boyfriends so you better get with it or shit's gonna be weird," Alec mutters to Eliot out of the corner of his mouth.

"Dammit, Hardison," Eliot hisses, and slides his arm around Alec's waist. Alec doesn't have much time to dwell on the distracting too-pleasant warmth of Eliot's arm against his back before Keith is right there in front of them and holding out his hand to shake.

"Jesus, how long has it been?" he says, smiling, shaking his head, like they parted on the best of terms and it's just been coincidence that they haven't spoken since. The handshake ends quickly, but it still lasts too long. Alec can see Eliot watching it like the spooky ex-hitman that he is and wonders what distinctive things he's picking up from Keith's grip.

"What the hell are you doing in Portland, man?" Alec bites out when Keith finally lets go, trying to keep it cheerful, friendly, and failing probably. Apparently Keith can't tell a fake smile that's right in front of his face though, because he only laughs and claps Alec's shoulder companionably - too companionably, if you ask Alec, and from the way he can see Eliot's lip curl in his peripherals he's not alone in that.

"What the hell are _you_ doing in Portland?" Keith non-answers. Alec itches for his phone, permanently suspicious of everyone after so long in his field of work, wants to check into Keith and see if he has a reason to avoid the question purposefully… Instead, Alec just stretches his painful grin further, and wraps a stiff arm around Eliot's even stiffer shoulders.

"Bought this little pub for, uh. For my… my best guy, here," he says, regretting nearly every word even as each one leaves his mouth. Eliot gives a very, very long sigh. That's fair. (This time.)

"Your what?" Keith says, the bridge of his nose scrunching up in that adorable dumb look that drew Alec to him in the first place - back when Alec was a baby gay with no taste, a tragic stage which all gays must grow through. Eliot, his very long sigh finally finished, steps up to the plate at last.

"His boyfriend, man," he says, his voice gruff but not growly like it is when he's not pretending. Alec still can't figure out how he strikes that balance, especially considering he also has that weird soft voice he uses to make people think he's an accountant or whatever. Not that Alec spends way more time than he should thinking about Eliot's voice. That would be ridiculous (read: understandable but sad). Alec may still have the occasional disaster, but even he is a distinguished enough gay by now to not be pining after his straight best friend.

"Oh!" Keith says, too loud, and his baby blues go comically wide. (Eliot's eyes aren't quite baby blue. They're- they're… Well, they're some other kind of blue. Like a vortex blue. Blue Screen of Death blue, except obviously not that actual color at all. Pretty. Alec avoids looking directly at them, because if he does he'll probably go blind or explode or something. Not that he spends that much time thinking about Eliot's eyes.) "Wow, if Alec bought you a restaurant you guys must be serious."

"Deadly," Eliot agrees, turning those eyes on Alec and narrowing them dangerously.

Yeah, so Alec is in trouble all sorts of different ways. Fine.

Keith laughs. He really is just… not a smart man. No sense of self preservation. Clearly.

"Oh," he says, shoving his hands awkwardly into his back pockets. "I guess, uh. I guess you wouldn't be wanting to grab dinner with an old flame then, huh?" And there it is. There it is, that god damn hangdog puppy look, that innocent dumb jock look, that helpless white boy look, that look that Alec fell for so many times. He won't fall for it again this time - he _won't_ \- but shit on a stick if Keith doesn't just look so pathetic. Maybe Alec really did read into things a little and Keith honestly misunderstood all those times Alec gave him a no that wasn't completely flat-out…

"No," Eliot says at Alec's side (sort of a little bit into Alec's ear, which is no big deal at all). It's not any kind of pretend voice, one hundred percent full-growl pure high quality organic Eliot Spencer (not that Alec has Eliot-voice preferences. That would imply that Alec spent his free time thinking about Eliot's voice, which of course he does not - though he would like to say, for the record, that Parker agrees with the ranking order he came up with). "No, he wouldn't. And no offense meant-" the offense meant is clear "-but I wouldn't really call you a 'flame' besides."

Keith's lips turn up into the hint of a sneer, and he huffs a disbelieving sort of half-laugh.

"You haven't really changed at all, have you?" he says to Alec, and it's obviously not a compliment. Not to mention just plain incorrect regardless.

"That's for me to know," Alec tells him, as haughtily as he can when he's still winding himself down from the whole Eliot-voice in his ear situation, "and you to wish you could find out." Keith snorts again, shakes his head.

"Wow," he says disdainfully.

"I know," Eliot murmurs, his voice gone just a touch softer again, and turns his head to look at Alec. Alec looks too and now they're staring into each other's eyes. Shit. The vortex. Down he goes. Goodbye cruel world, Alec Hardison lives in Eliot's eyes now. "He's amazing, isn't he?"

Alec sighs - that's right he sighs, like an infatuated teen - and doesn't particularly take note of whether Keith is leaving or not.

The bell on the door jingles. Eliot's eyes are so pretty.

Eliot blinks, looks down, takes his arm off of Alec's waist. He backs away slowly. Returns to his beer, to taking up more space on the barstool than there actually is. Alec stays where he is, trying to bring himself back down into reality - the slightly incomplete feeling reality where Eliot is single and only Alec and Parker are dating each other because Eliot is their straight best friend.

"So are you gonna tell me the story behind that, or what?" Eliot grumbles from behind the rim of his glass. "And it better be good, or I'm gonna kick your ass."

So Alec takes a deep breath, shoves his heart into its big boy pants, and sits down on the stool next to Eliot. He'll tell the story, and he'll probably get a pseudo-asskicking that will not be flirting no matter how much he'll want it to be. And he'll tell Parker both stories later. He'll just generally be very grown up and graceful and shit.

He won't pine.

He won't.


End file.
